Business

Hal Crenshaw has sold one of Lancaster County’s most recognizable small businesses, Crenco Food Stores, which grew out of the company his father started a half century ago.
The group of five convenience stores was purchased this week by Virginia-based GPM Southeast, the sixth-largest private owner of convenience stores in the country.
The sale has been in the works for months – GPM applied for beer and wine permits several weeks ago – but Crenshaw had refused to talk about it until the transaction was completed.

About 300 local business people, corporate sponsors and guests piled into The Lodge at Sun City Carolina Lakes on Thursday for the Lancaster County Chamber of Commerce’s annual soiree, a night of celebration, award presentations and the changing of the guard.
The event, presented by Founders Federal Credit Union, was the chamber’s 62nd annual meeting. Chamber members got dressed up, ate good food, enjoyed live music and toasted the accomplishments of six award honorees – Pamela Trimnal, Odell Steele, J.C. Rainey, Melissa Prince, and Pat and Michael Clancy.

The affected products were available for purchase after Dec. 13, and limited to certain Aldi stores in Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, North Carolina and South Carolina, the company said in a statement.

Movement Mortgage held a raucus pep rally and a “mudbreaking” in the rain Wednesday, launching construction of a facility that will double its workforce in Indian Land.
Nearly 800 cheering employees packed the lobby of the company’s not quite two-year-old headquarters in Bailes Ridge Corporate Park.

Fab Fours Inc., one of Lancaster County’s small-industry success stories, is doubling its workforce, saying big sales growth is driving the expansion.
The company, which manufactures aftermarket bumpers for vehicles, announced plans Friday to add 88 employees and spend $5.7 million adding equipment to its plant off Riverside Road. It now has about 80 employees.
With the new workers, Fab Fours’ employment will have increased more than tenfold since it moved to Lancaster County just seven years ago.

The owner of Canadian bakery Fancy Pokket said Friday that the company’s long-delayed Lancaster County manufacturing operation should be up and running in January.
Mike Timani made the announcement during a conference call from Canada to the company’s gleaming new plant in Lancaster’s Air and Rail Industrial Park on S.C. 9 West.
The January estimate is the latest of many start-up projections for a company plagued by delays almost from the start. As of late last year, it was to have begun producing gluten-free baked goods this past March.

Aldi is investing $2.2 million to renovate its Lancaster store at 1201 Old Charlotte Road, just north of S.C. 9 Bypass, according to the Lancaster Building and Zoning Department.

The grocery company is aiming to expand and remodel over 1,300 stores by 2020 through a $1.6 billion nationwide plan. According to Aldi, the Lancaster store is one of 31 stores in the Charlotte area that will be part of the company initiative. The grocery chain has set aside $48 million for remodeling these stores.

RICHBURG – Dignitaries marveled at Chester County’s new economic jewel Wednesday – the $560 million, 1.7 million-square-foot Giti Tire plant, likening it to the BMW and Boeing investments that have transformed other parts of the state.

NEWBERRY – Cleanliness, it’s said, is next to godliness. It also can save lives – untold numbers, in fact.

On farms and in food processing and handling facilities, this kind of cleanliness is more than just washing your hands. It’s full-fledged biosecurity, and it’s changing the way farmers involved in animal agriculture work.

Page Vaughan was named Springs Memorial Hospital’s new chief executive officer on Monday.
Vaughan, CEO of Chester Regional Medical Center, will continue to oversee the Chester hospital in addition to SMH. Both hospitals are owned by Community Health Systems, based in Franklin, Tenn.
“I’m really looking forward to it,” Vaughan said Tuesday. “It’s a good team of people in a really nice community.”